Young Adult Literature
A.S. King / Ask the Passengers (Little, Brown Books For Young Readers)

2012 Finalists

Innovator's Award
Margaret Atwood

Kirsch Award
Kevin Starr

Biography
H.W. Brands / The Man Who Saved the Union: Ulysses Grant in War and Peace (Doubleday)
Robert Caro / The Passage of Power: The Years of Lyndon Johnson (Knopf)
Alice Kessler-Harris / A Difficult Woman: The Challenging Life and Times of Lillian Hellman (Bloomsbury Press)
David Nasaw / The Patriarch: The Remarkable Life and Turbulent Times of Joseph P. Kennedy (Penguin Press)
R.J. Smith / The One: The Life and Music of James Brown (Gotham Books)

History
John Barry / Roger Williams and the Creation of the American Soul: Church, State, and the Birth of Liberty (Viking)
George Black / Empire of Shadows: The Epic Story of Yellowstone (St. Martin’s Press)
Fergus M. Bordewich / America’s Great Debate: Henry Clay, Stephen A. Douglas, and the Compromise That Preserved the Union (Simon & Schuster)
Amy S. Greenberg / A Wicked War: Polk, Clay, Lincoln, and the 1846 U.S. Invasion of Mexico (Knopf)
Geoffrey Kabaservice / Rule & Ruin: The Downfall of Moderation and the Destruction of the Republican Party from Eisenhower to the Tea Party (Oxford University Press)

Science & Technology
Susan Cain / Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking (Crown)
George Dyson / Turing’s Cathedral: The Origins of the Digital Universe (Pantheon)
Jonathan Gottschall / The Storytelling Animal: How Stories Make Us Human (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Nate Silver / The Signal and the Noise: Why so Many Predictions Fail — But Some Don’t (Penguin Press)
Florence Williams / Breasts: A Natural and Unnatural History (W.W. Norton & Company)

Bookreporter.com Bets On

Books On Screen

Breaking news: Love is no longer the aggresive, beating heart of February! Or at least you wouldn’t know that it is just by considering the movies coming out this month. Whereas in past Februarys (Februaries?), we cinephiles have been bombarded with all manner of romantic films --- comedies, dramas, classics and otherwise --- this year Hollywood seems to have given us a much-needed break. So unless you consider Fifty Shades of Grey a love story for the ages (no judgment), there is neither a lovestruck heroine nor a grand romantic gesture in sight. It looks like we dodged a heart-shaped bullet this year...at least until March!